Marty Sumichrast, author

On February 10th, 1987, I wrote my first business check for $1,087.63 for office expenses and supplies for a new company that my father started, Builders Publications of America, Inc. I was 21 and working my first office job. At the time, I thought this a huge amount of money. I had never balanced a checkbook and was nervous as hell as I double checked to make sure that my signature was legible.

How would I know that 21 years later, I would look back on a career that took me from that small publications company, to making (and losing) millions on Wall Street, taking part in the re-emergence of Eastern and Central Europe after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and riding the tide of the Chinese expansion into the US capital markets? I have now written tens-of-millions of dollars in checks, employed hundreds of people, had great success in business as well as lived terrible defeats. I have dined with heads of states and have had my share of run-ins with some unscrupulous characters. One must die a thousand deaths to build a business. No true businessman has ever had success in every deal. Not even the famous investor Warren Buffet has been right 100% of the time. Remember his investment in US Airways? He lost his shirt. The point is that business is tough and is a risky proposition. If you plan on starting your own business then you’d better have the temperament for the ups and downs without the fear of failing. A former trader and salesman I met in my early days on Wall Street used to say, “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.” Much of the discussion in this blog will be about entrepreneurship. With more than 80% of small businesses failing in the first 5 years you will hear me discuss both the successes and speed bumps of business. I encourage experiencing both and will discuss topics related to both. My perspective is, you may take the heat from failure but that’s ok, it will strengthen your resolve to move on. If entrepreneurship was so easy, everybody would do it.